Another successful night for the Wallan Panthers women’s team moves it closer to the top of the table into third position.
The Panthers took to the trip up to Shepparton to play the Gators who sat second last coming into the matchup.
Starting strong, the home team took an early lead in the first term leading by four points for majority the majority of it.
In the second, they continued to lead giving themselves a four point buffer at the half.
The Gators field goal percentage was far better than the Panthers, which was important for the travelling team to discuss at half time.
The third term saw Wallan start to gain some more control in the game.
Their three-point percentage jumped from 12 per cent to 33 including two successful attempts from Ranika Guyton.
Their stars, including Guyton, started to warm up. Emmie Gardiner and Maddison O’Nial joined in on the scoring and the Panthers cut the Shepparton lead to only one and the final break.
The Panthers came out to dominate the final term, going on a 13-0 run from the start of the quarter which gave them a lead of 12 points with three minutes remaining.
They showed their dominance in defence and proved to the competition that they will be a team to beat in the back end of the season.
Guyton finished with 23 points and Gardiner finished with 16 as the two best players in the game for Wallan.
Next week’s match features a top of the table clash against first placed Chelsea, which could look to be a potential grand final preview.
On the men’s side, they had the five-hour travel to Mildura which was a one-sided affair.
The men’s Panthers team, who sits seventh, were no match for second-placed Mildura.
Wallan’s form looks to be a major concern towards the second half of the season as they’ve suffered 5 losses in a row.
The game was dominated by the home side within the first quarter as they doubled the Panthers score by the first break.
Mildura went on three different 11-point runs throughout the game and basically led from the first minute.
The term was another blowout thrashing leaving the visitors no chance.
After half time the foot was taken off the gas slightly as the Panthers went basket-for-basket in the third quarter, but couldn’t respond in the last, going down by 34 points in a worrying period for the side.
They look forward to another game on the road against Warrnambool this Saturday.
By the time they’ve played that game and come home, they would’ve travelled 1662 kilometres within just two games.